Before the development of more efficient transportation we have today, produce such as fruits and vegetables were not transported very far to the place of consumption. Because the transportation distance and time of transport was not great, would-be consumers who lived a distance from the farm or orchard were able to obtain fresh ready to eat produce. However, those consumers could only obtain local produce due to the produce being perishable for long distance transport and thus, could not obtain a wide selection of fruits and vegetables. Therefore, the only fruits and vegetables available at all would be those that are “in season” at farms or orchards that were not too far away.
Since the development of shipping, it has become commonplace to transport nearly all kinds of fruits and vegetables great distances to consumers. From the consumer's point of view, this has led to an extremely wide selection of fruits and vegetables, and the breadth of the selection is maintained throughout the year.
Part of what makes this selection possible is that many fruits and vegetables are picked when they are not yet ripe. This permits shipping the produce in refrigerated trucks with the intention that the produce will ripen at a later time, particularly when shipping internationally in the case of fruits such as avocado and kiwi fruits. It is well known that cold temperatures inhibits ripening.
The science behind ripening of ethylene producing produce is well documented. Such produce include apples, apricots, avocados, bananas, blueberries, cantaloupe, cherimoyas, cranberries, figs, green onions, guavas, grapes, honeydew, kiwifruit, mangoes, mangosteen, nectarines, papayas, passion fruit, peaches, pears, persimmons, plums, potatoes, prunes, quince and tomatoes, to name a few. These types of produce are ripened as a result of naturally occurring respiration in which ethylene, a ripening hormone is produced and released. As ethylene converts starch into sugar, carbon dioxide (CO2) is emitted as a by-product of respiration. Some ethylene producing produce also emit methane, usually late in the ripening process. Although ethylene is essential in ripening produce, carbon dioxide inhibits ripening and methane tends to promote over-ripening.
It is known in the industry to supply ethylene gas in ripening warehouses to help the produce ripen. It is also known to purge the ambient air about the produce to flush away carbon dioxide which is emitted by produce during ripening and which interferes with ripening. These methods are used prior to shipping produce to supermarkets in an attempt to have the produce ripe for sale at the grocery store. In many cases it is assumed that some of the ripening can happen in transit, and that some of the ripening may happen while the produce is in the store awaiting purchase. In some cases, however, produce bought at the grocery store are not ripe for immediate consumption. Thus, some of the ripening may happen in the home of the consumer, particularly in winter months because cold temperature inhibits ripening and this could happen in grocery store warehouses and when consumers travel back to their homes from grocery stores in cold weather. In addition, produce that are starting to ripen or soften are often squeezed by other consumers again and again, when they assess ripening and this practice causes bruising and browning of the pulp and provide consumers with low quality fruits.
Ripening in the home is not easy to get right. Many consumers are not aware of how to ripen produce correctly. Those consumers who are aware how to ripen produce correctly may nonetheless not have needed equipment and facilities to ripen the produce correctly. Finally, some prior art apparatus that is meant to assist a consumer in ripening produce does not work well for its purpose.
One way to ripen produce is simply to store it in open space until it has ripened. This has drawbacks. For example the produce may ripen on a day that is earlier or later than the day the consumer wished to make use of the produce. The consumer who wishes to guard against this problem will be forced to purchase produce on several different days, gambling that one or another days' worth of produce may happen to ripen on the desired day. This requires storage space for the batches of produce, and risks wasting some of the produce. Another drawback is that the ripening period is quite long.
A way to ripen produce faster is to store it in an enclosed container, sometimes in combination with a banana, which is known to produce ethylene at a higher rate. However, the produce will ripen unevenly due to the carbon dioxide and methane within the container, yielding much waste since banana are over ripe and wasted in this process, and the subject produce may not ripen at all.
Thus, a system and apparatus for evenly and quickly ripening produce is needed.